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April 17, 2015

State of Social: How To Build A Cult Following

4.17 sunglass edited

Last month, Delucchi Plus sent Senior Content Strategist Drew Lawrence and Digital Strategist/Social Advertising Expert Isel Galvan to New York City for Social Media Week. Throughout that week, Drew and Isel attended countless workshop sessions and industry panels featuring some prominent industry leaders from around the country that discussed the state of social media. This series explores their key learnings.

“Cult Branding is the result of a superior understanding of the customer where consumer insights (big data) and humanities (human needs) come together” — The Cult Branding Company

You don’t have to be an international superstar to understand the value and benefits that come with building a cult brand following. New and young brands understand this all too well, as they try to build their brand and communities on a budget.

For those unfamiliar with the term, cult followings for brands deal with the art and science of creating a human experience that leads to a feeling of exclusivity and belonging. This feeling is so strong and effective that many loyal consumers advocate for their favorite brands so passionately that they convince others to feel the same way based on their personal connection to the brand.

While social media has allowed brands to build relationships with consumers and find new audiences, there’s a lot more noise than there was before. Young brands must find a way to stand out by having a strong point of view.

While we share some takeaways below, brands must remember one thing and one thing only above all else. Cult followings for the most successful brands are solely based on emotion and exclusivity. The feel of passion, and belonging is at the heart of all cult followings. Instead of feeding money into your brand — feed the people who will love you!

Understand and Reach Fans

  • Community is at the center of cult brands
  • Know who your top evangelists are, and understand why they are who they are and why they like what they like
  • Use constant communication with your audiences and always keep a conversational tone
  • Find a way to connect with your customers in real life
  • Customers need community belonging
  • Listen to what people say about your brand and take that feedback seriously
  • Don’t forget to listen to the haters — and then prove them wrong!

Develop a Strong Persona Both Online and Offline

  • You need to tell a good story about your brand or product – especially in a way that evokes emotion
  • Act more like a church and less like a company — start with building and strengthening a sense of community
  • Ask yourself: “What is the smallest way I can tell a story that evokes emotion?”
  • To maintain a cult status, your community has to feel like they own a piece of your business

Stand Out

  • Have a strong approach and avoid saying what everybody else is saying
  • Play to your uniqueness: Learn what makes you special and why your evangelists appreciate you over the competition

Be Exclusive

  • Let people have a behind-the-scenes view of you company
  • Exclusive partnerships can help strengthen a cult following, but only if they are also able to connect to your community. The best partnerships are those that fit your voice and vision
  • Disrupt the status quo

Cultivate User Engagement

  • Enable your community members to empower other community members — self-sufficient brand communities are the future
  • To keep their cultness from fleeting, continue to surprise your audience

Focus

  • Focus your efforts toward particular niche audiences where you can find your brand cult followers and evangelists early on
  • Narrowing your targeting — at least early on — will help you be more successful in making your followers happy
  • Embrace failure, stay nimble and then innovate

(Photo: Girl with Sunglasses in a Bed by Viktor Hanacek via picjumbo.com)